Lee n Tan

We booked Kedi for an 8am pickup but didn’t finish brekkie until 8.30am – today we are off to the Temples.

What an amazing place – first stop Angkor Wat. The ruins date back to the early 12th century (between 1113 and 1150) and it is the worlds largest religious monument. The site covers 200 hectares – a rectangle 1.5km x 1.3km. The moat that surrounds the city is 190m wide, the scale of this place is massive!!! The bas-reliefs are one of the most famous creations in Khmer art, they are in the gallery that surrounds the main area. The carved area is about 600m in length and stands 2m high. The carvings depict battles fought, Heaven and Hell and many other scenes of the time, they are very detailed.

The next area we visited was Angkor Thom which was one of the largest cities built in the area – 9km square. This area was all about faces and elephants. Bayon at the centre was one of our favourites, there is said to be 200 faces sculpted in stone around the site. Our trip around Angkor Thom was hindered a little as a young monk (fake) lead us up the garden path (so to speak) so we did miss some of the more interesting areas! From what I can remember we saw Bapuon, which was covered with scaffolding as it is being resorted so we could not enter, Tep Pranam (large seated Buddha), Preah Palilay (small chimney like). After walking around these for a couple of hours we had lunch then went on to Banteay Kdei and Ta Prohm.

Ta Prohm was not as mind blowing as what we thought it was going to be, there are some very good photographers out there! After this temple we had both had enough as the day was very hot so we called it quits for the day and headed back to Rosy’s.

Another sluggish start to the day so our tuk-tuk driver ‘Kedi’ suggested we do some other site seeing instead of the temples. We headed off to the Floating Village of Chong Kneas, being the end of the dry season the water level was not very high so there where a few points where we nearly ran aground. We had our own long tail boat to take us around the sites, the village was amazing the houses are just very rustic houseboats. The wet season is approaching so a lot of the homes were being towed into the canal area by long tail boats to shelter from the rough weather out on the lake.

The village has just about everything to be self sufficient – mechanics, shops, schools, basketball courts etc all floating on the water. The village is mostly sustained by catching and selling/trading fish, a lot of the families have fish farms. You could also see some smaller pontoons that housed pigs and chickens. We stopped off at one of the shops to buy some pencils and notebooks for the school kids then delivered them to their teacher and had some photos taken.

Also during the trip we stopped off at ‘’ that housed some crocodiles (the lake used to have loads but now they have all been killed off). They also had a live snake that you could hold – if anyone has had a snake around their neck before you will know how I was feeling when Lee took my photo!! The thing I was amazed with was how strong they were when they started to move around. We spent 1.5 hours puttering around the village and saw all sorts of village life, it was very interesting and I think well worth the trip.

After the floating village Kedi took us to Artisans d’Angkor which is a centre for arts and ancient crafts. Quote ‘Artisans d’Angkor promotes the fair, sustainable development of Cambodian arts and crafts with benefits to rural communities. It provides training to young Cambodians, enabling them to rediscover lost ancient talents and make a living from their skills while working right in their home villages. It has created over 1,000 jobs, of which 624 involve craftsmen. Twelve workshops are currently operating in Siem Reap province. Since its establishment, Artisans d’Angkor has pioneered a new social policy in Cambodia with guaranteed levels of pay along with social and medical benefits. The craftsmen have formed an association known as Artisanat Khmer, which holds a 20-percent share in the company.’

Another branch of Artisans d’Angkor is the Silk Farm, where you get to see the whole process of making silk. They show you right from the mulberry trees that they feed the silk worms through to making the fabric. The outer layer of the cocoon makes raw silk and the inner layer is used to make fine silk and they way they harvest the thread is amazing. The afternoon was really great and we also got to see everyday life around the town as we were motoring to our next destination, I think that sometimes that is the best part!!

We went out with Betsy, Jude and Rob to the Night Market and then pulled up a seat at one of the street stalls for dinner.

When we woke at 7am (Lee had a booked a tuk-tuk for 8.30am to take us out to Angkor) I said there was no way I could do the temples with a ‘day after migraine’ head so we cancelled the tuk-tuk and went back to bed.

We woke at 11.30am went downstairs for brunch, hung out for a little while then went back to the room and watched some movies.

When we surfaced again it was near dark and we had not done a thing all day, so we decided to take a walk down town along the river. We walked around the Old Market and then back up the other side of the river. The town of Siem Reap is a very quiet, sleepy town around the river. Lee played pool with Rob, Yella and Noortje, he taught them how to play the game we learnt on Koh Tao from the locals. He ended up winning about $20US, that pays for a nights accommodation. I sat chatting with Betsy and Jude.

Our 7am pickup turned up late and to top it off we were last on the minibus. We ended up sitting in the shitty 1 1/2 person seat right down the back beside the bags which encroached on our space even more, the smallest people in the van ended up with a 3 person seat…..not fair!! The traffic heading out of Bangkok was horrendous, gridlock city. Our driver was definitely Thai, he was insane. When we went around corners the van would sway and because of where we were sitting every time we went over a bump we hit our heads on the top of the back window!

At about 11.30am we stopped about 5 minutes from the border for lunch/scam!! At the lunch place there where guys rushing around getting details from you for the visa into Cambodia. They were charging 1300 Baht for an express visa. We informed our little helper that we did not have any Baht left on us, we only had US dollars so he offered a visa at $35US. What a joke we knew we could get it at the border for $20US so we asked him what the extra $15 was for…he said it was for the express processing fee. When we still said no he said we would not be able to get a Visa at the border…… we stood our ground!

We hopped back in the van, I think one way or another nearly everyone else in the van had overpaid for their Visas (there were 2 American guys that had been in the country already who knew better). When we hopped out of the van another guy wanted to sell us a visa and said that the visa office was closed and the only way we would get one was through his tin roofed lean two ….. we still pushed on!!

We had to go through quarantine first and have our temperature taken for swine flu, once that was over the scamming started again, these guys actually had uniforms on!! They said we could only pay in Thai baht, they did however have a lower price of 1000 Baht but we still let them know we did no have enough Baht to pay. Eventually they said $20US with a 200 Baht processing fee!! We handed them $40US and 200 Baht and they handed this through the window, then they asked for another 200 Baht. I was grabbed it out of Lee’s wallet and then I tried to hand it through the window but one of the guys just snatched it out of my hands and put it in his pocket with a little smirk on his face……corruption at its best…. what are you to do!!

The rest of the process went pretty smoothly, it was quite a joke really as the people on our van that paid the extra money were behind us in the final line up……so much for the quick processing fee. The border was an amazing place, in between leaving Thailand and crossing the Cambodian border is what we called ‘No-man’s-land’ it was full of Casinos for the Thais. It is illegal in Thailand so all they have to do is pay a fee to get in and they don’t have to cross the border into Cambodia but can stay at the casino hotel for a couple of days and gamble.

We found ourselves a car taxi ($45US) and hit the road to Siem Reap at about 1.30pm. As soon as we started driving we definitely knew we were in a different country. The roads were not finished properly, everything was dusty and dirty and the land is sooooo flat (all farming land, mostly rice paddies). The other odd thing is they drive on the right hand side of the road but have left and right hand drive vehicles…..confusing!!!

When we arrived in Siem Reap our taxi dropped us at a servo and from there a tuk-tuk driver took us to the guest house we wanted. He kept wanting to know when he could pick us up tomorrow but he had no info about the temples etc and we said we wanted to settle in before doing the temples (this is the gateway to Angkor Wat!!!).

Rosy Guest House was fantastic, we paid $20US for a Deluxe Room normally $25. I wasn’t feeling the best as we hadn’t eaten since about 6.30am so my head was playing up a little. We had a bit to eat and then chilled out in the room. We went back down for dinner and met up with Jude and Betsy two girls that have been working together in Japan, a guy called Rob from San Francisco also joined us. We played a few games of shithead and had a few drinks. I went to bed around 12 and Lee sat up with them until about 2ish.